North Star NSC25ED

[Donald George]

Nice to be told about this forum. Our North Star softener is six years old and has had no problems until now. I add two or three bags of salt pellets every four months. Check venturi yearly and have never found anything in it. Use broom handle periodically to prevent salt bridging as suggest by manufacturer. The softener stopped producing soft water recently. Check for error codes and there were none. Unit cycles through regeneration steps as found in manual. Pulled out fill valve and it is clear. Problem found is there in no brine in bottom of tank,just mush. Removed salt pellets with wet/dry vac and found mush. Finally got mush liquid enough to vacuum out. Unit is ready for initial water fill(three gallons) and salt. How do I keep this from happening again. North Star recommends Morton softener salt which I purchase at Walmart. I spent thirty some years in power generation maintenance where we used big cation/anion units so I understand how the process works. Just don't know enough about this small residential softener to prevent it from going down. Any help we be appreciated. Gland a kind soul put me on to your form.Thanks

 

[ditttohead]

Personally I prefer coarse solar salt, not the pellets. Since salt is very expensive to ship you may not have this locally available. Solar salt can be a little dirtier than most pellets but cleaning your brine tank every few years is not that big of a deal.